Berkeley: A “bumper stickery” kind of town

Berkeleyside is delighted to introduce our first podcast — one of many we hope. As we routinely publish writing, photography and video, we thought, “why not do it all?”, and so we are adding audio.

John Rieger, who created today’s podcast, is an award-winning independent producer and former editor of the public radio series Beyond Computers. In his 30-year career in public radio, John, who lives in Berkeley, has documented subjects from science to civil liberties to modern art, and he has appeared as host of Radio Smithsonian and Weekend All Things Considered. Nancy Rubin, a retired BUSD teacher and long-time Berkeley resident, is one of Berkeleyside’s favorite contributing photographers and shot the images for the slideshow that accompanies the podcast, above.

We plan to produce more podcasts and collect them all together on a podcast channel which you can subscribe to. That way, you can download them onto your phone or iPod and listen to them on your travels.

And we are eager to hear your ideas for future podcasts. What subjects would you like John to cover? Which places would be ideal for him to pop up in? Berkeleyans are not usually shy about voicing their opinions. What questions should we be asking? Jot your ideas down in the Comments section below, or email us at tips@berkeleyside.com.

But first, click on the play button above and enjoy today’s 4-minute show.